I've discussed Bitcoin and blockchains on this website before. This article is about the failure of that system, at least in the case of Bitcoin. The reasons are on the one hand technical, but on the other hand, the result of human failure. In a nutshell, the production of new Bitcoins has essentially been monopolized - At a recent conference over 95% of hashing power was controlled by a handful of guys sitting on a single stage - and these people have an incentive to prevent growth, creating an artificial scarcity, even to the point where delays and congestion are causing the network to fail. There are measures that would fix the problem, but discussion of them has been banned in Bitcoin forums and conferences. If it reminds you of, say, the economy of New Brunswick, or any small economy dominated by a few very large companies, it should. Democracy and diversity build networks and economies; authority and centralization destroys them.